Shamanic call: Sun stare, thorn climb, blue rose

I have retitled this as Sun Stare to avoid conflict with native
groups who believe that my experience was not a sundance and/or
the term sundance is exclusively native.

Now I will get to my September, 1991 mystic sun stare/thorn climb/blue
rose vision first manic episode, at the age of 27.5, or 2.5 solar
cycles, 2-7 days before new moon, with onset 2-3 days after
an M-class solar flare.
I'll subdivide this page later, or add more navigational jumps. If you
are only interested in the sun stare and blue rose vision skim over
the first few paragraphs and jump to
Sun stare. It is written in a rather dry
prosaic first person style which might put people off more than a
third person account or mystic poem/story laden with glorious
symbolic imagery would, but some like facts.

In early August of 1991 I was back in Newfoundland, and experienced a
stellar folk festival, including the last time I heard
Newfoundland fiddler Emile Benoit (last album was Vive la Rose,
named after a Belgian folk song) live. I think he used to swirl the
chi at concerts as well as I do or better, since on one occasion when Figgy Duff
was on stage I felt something and turned around and there he was
dancing. I thought of his music while on the thorns (later).

Not long after I returned to Vancouver I and some friends caught an
amazing near-sunset outdoor concert from Sarah McLachlan, at the PNE
bowl, Aug. 28, 1991. During her set a formation of dark birds
wheeled by in the background, reminding me (now) of some "mermaids"
(humpback whales) I had heard on the Southern Avalon in the summer of
1983, also backed by birds and a mystic sunset. Anyway, Sarah's
voice flowed through me like a river, leaving me buoyed up later, but
not hypomanic yet.

That week I was busy planning orientation activities for the UBC grad
student centre, including a big concert with celtic rock band
The Stoaters, plus
hoping to have some geophysics Ph.D. thesis work ready to show my
supervisor. This stress and associated sleep deprivation also
contributed to the intensity of the mystic manic episode, later.

Then on the afternoon of Saturday, Aug. 31, 1991, I walked down the
hill to deliver a deposit cheque for my fall Iyengar yoga class to my
new teacher, Gioia Irwin, who I had not met before except by phone.
When I met her it seemed as though there was an energy about her (not
visual), a lightness, and this transferred to me --- after I gave her
the cheque I bounced up the hill. This I have come to realize was a
proximity-induced raising of kundalini, or shaktipat, though in some
cases it is more sudden, and can even manifest like an epileptic
seizure. In this case it was one of many factors (including music)
and was gradual. But it is well known in the Kundalini literature
that such shaktipat awakening of Kundalini can trigger or be
equivalent to a manic attack. I wonder if some of other such cases still
living have cycles similar to mine, most bipolars do not.

In the evening of Aug. 31, 1991, there
was a crack or two of clear sky lightning, just after sunset. Such
flashes have occurred at the start of two later waning crescent
hypomanic episodes as
well. One morning of that week, about Sept. 3, there was another flash
through my curtains, but that was probably a reflection of sunlight
off moving glass. I postulate that clear sky lightning
flashes result from ionospheric activity 2 to 3 days after
an M-class or larger solar flare.

That evening (Aug. 31) I had an excellent seafood meal at a Greek
restaurant and then dragged some friends to a multi-media performance
concert at the Pitt International Gallery. This had art on the walls,
performance poetry, improvisational jazz, and two rock bands: Zza Zza
& the Angels (or Limos?) and Rockaway Revue, to whom I did some
ecstatic sweaty dancing to 3 a.m. This creative stuff and dancing was
another factor in the manic trigger.

After the multi-media performance art/rock show, I went home
and took a shower and then, in the early hours of Sept. 1/91,
a shower of ideas began. At first all were good and related to my
grad centre orientation plans, but then after a day or two I was
trying to write down too much and implement too much for that year by
myself. The ideas expanded in circles to healing problems with the
campus and then to establishing a grad student run think tank to solve
many of the problems with society. I put some of this in a slightly
garbled memo to the university deans and president, and after that my
supervisor talked me into setting a psychiatrist's appointment for
Friday September 6.

As it turned out, not all my ideas that week (Sept. 1--5) were bad; my
concert organization resulted in the most successful event in the
history of the UBC grad student society, on Sept. 13, but I missed it
since by that time I was in hospital.

Then on the late morning of Thursday, September, 5, 1991 I awoke
refreshed and feeling that all was right with the world, that a new
age was at hand; that all the people who were in for "20 years of
boredom" (to quote Leonard Cohen) were coming back, and that there
would be a meeting at Vancouver's nude Wreck Beach of lots of
hippies/celts/pagans/new-agers/gypsies/etc later that day.

That day I saw beautiful linkages in all my music and books, and left
them strewn around the apartment. I played stuff such as John
Lennon's Instant Karma/Give Peace a Chance/All we are Saying from
the Shaved Fish LP. I put on every button I owned, then decided they
looked too gaudy and took them off. I then left my watch/keys/wallet
there, left my apartment door wide open (and at the time the building
front door was unlocked) and an incredibly long orientation week event
listing on my GE answering machine, and then walked off towards Wreck
Beach.

I walked east on W.4th, then through Jericho Beach (folk festival
site), then Locarno/Spanis Banks East/Spanish Banks West and towards
Tower Beach, a few hours before sunset. But I didn't make it to the
(watch)Tower Beach, let alone Wreck Beach.

Sun stare:
A few hundred meters east of the first tower I began gradually
stripping off as I proceded forward. First went my nice Banff centre
sweatshirt, then brand new runners and socks, then my sweatpants, then
finally about a hundred meters east of the first tower (around the
bend so the tower is not visible, I think), I dropped my few-month old
red glasses in the shallow water to be completely naked (well outside
the nude beach area) and with out of focus vision of anything more than
a few inches away. During the stripping process I
chose my path carefully, as if it had symbolic meaning --- i.e., it
mattered whether I went around a log or over it, under a net line or
over it, and so on. Also I symbolically linked land and sea by
tossing a floating object into the trees and a beach rock or log into
the water.

Just before this there was brief vision of a number of spirits, like a
stream of blurry spirits flowing by, one with a western hat. I rarely
(almost never, except for this day/night) have any visions, and
interpret this as those who had done something like this before.

This stripping, and the sun stare (next), was also witnessed by a few people
on the beach, including an old fisher.

Then I waded out to knee or hip deep water. It was near high tide. I
then began a "call to the sun" with little leg movement but arm gestures at
the sun, and some noises, perhaps a chant of some kind. I don't
remember if I had Sarah McLachlan's song Into the Fire ("I shall
stare at the sun, until its light doesn't blind me") in mind but may
have, at least subconsciously, though that was only one factor, and I
had not thought of her much all week, if at all. I certainly did not
have that song in mind when I set out that day. The next line of
the song ("I shall walk into the fire...") I now (1997) interpret as
related to coming out of the solar low forsaken/wilderness year, the
ashes of the Hindu cremation ground, into new creativity.

I then began staring at the sun, a white throbbing disk, when the
time was not much more than two hours
before sunset. Normally I would have sneezed to avert the eyes, but
this time did not. (Luckily I did not have my -11/-10 diopter lenses
on, so any focus formed well off the retina.) Instead I stared
intently until it seemed that my entire being was extending out and
calling to the sun and even beyond, in some sort of tunnelling effect,
I think a glimpse into higher dimensions, and sort of as if you
placed two mirrors facing one another and peeked inside,
that sort of curved tunneling (which also looked like a divine
curved horn of oil with its wide mouth towards me).
I was caught up in a powerful mystic experience. It was as if
there was a higher dimensional unfolding, as if the 3 dimensions
tilted or dimpled somehow and there was a wraparound effect, as if
there were giant butterfly wings folding in around me. I, a mere
mortal, grabbing at the skyhook, was then overloaded and blacked out
for an instant. I fell forward into the water and came to almost
immmediately, and with back arched and chest up floating as if in the
upward-facing-dog pose of the yoga sun salutation (inhaled
and chest up so I wouldn't drown). So that was sort of baptism
by nature in a way, and possibly extension to my higher
dimensional form that I have gradually learned to use some I think (and
may continue to gradually learn to use) later and as a result
I think I may have some special abilities though some of those
are episodic, and I have yet to prove objectively that I have
special abilities, but to me, subjectively, they appear to work
at times. Some discussion of such will go in the section
avatar-1's, avatar-2's, Yoginis, devis, and soul when I
complete that section, it currently isn't there yet but may be by the
time you read this. But note that I have no divination ability,
even though in the past I have thought I did.

This was observed by a few people, including an old fisher, who
then got me to pull on his net (perhaps for luck? or I may have
imagined the request) but seeing that I was not much good at it
(my brother James would be better), he
gestured me away. Perhaps he was Musqueam but I suspect Greek
Canadian.

Also as I began up the hill away from the beach, leaving my clothes
and glasses behind, I put my hand on a pair of flip-flop beach sandals
that someone had left on a rock, and a young couple told me to leave them,
to get my own stuff. But I stupidly did not go back for my stuff or
forward along the beach to the nude Wreck Beach, but straight up the
sandy, not thorny, slope towards (supposedly) the grad centre where I wanted to get
(naked :-]) before sunset.

My eyes were not damaged much if at all, probably partly because the
pupils closed up a bit, partly because it was two hours before sunset
and not high noon, partly because a full sun disk is actually less
damaging than an eclipse sliver, and partly because my eyes are so bad
that, with my glasses off (they were), the focus formed well in front
of the retina. I don't recommend
anyone else trying this "sun stare" unless he or she is
inspired and also very short-sighted like me.

So anyway, on the hill I could not see much, but that was just because
of my lack of glasses (plus later the dark night of two days
before new moon).

As it turned out, though I didn't know, the point where I stopped for
the sun stare is below the thorniest hillside along NW Marine Drive
(not far east and slightly down the hill from the Museum of Anthropology)
in Vancouver's Pacific Spirit Park. Blackberry (actually they may
be a similar species with thicker vines) thorns spill from out onto NW
Marine Drive at the top to down about 2/3 of the way to the beach.
The top is now cut back a little for a bicycle path but is easy to
spot, lots of thorns, near/above the first residential street
intersection with Marine Drive as you go down, not the first patch
of thorns as you go down NW Marine Drive but a much bigger patch
with perhaps 5 m of extent next to the bicycle path;
in fact I am more sure
of the top location now than the bottom.

But at the bottom it was a sandy slope, and I had no indication of the
pain in store my naked body. As I started up the sandy ground
gradually got steeper and then more overgrown and slightly thorny.
Eventually I admitted to myself that I wouldn't get up to the grad
centre by sunset and thought I would be left behind in some exodus,
having opened the way. (But no, we were all left to work towards
heaven on earth.)
I then did a mini-stare-at-the-sun, this time
through a leaf, with a much slighter upper samodhi/kundalini surge
effect (no lower chakra shakti surge, which developed since).
On the way up some tree sap fell on me and I ate it.

After that it gradually got dark, and I progressed on upwards. It got
thornier and thornier, but I felt that this would be over soon, this
must be the worst. Eventually I came to one clay/sand area with few
thorns, a hollow with lots of thorns above it, and there felt kind of
paranoid that the military were out to get me. I hid there,
pretending to be a rock or tree, and waited, cold and alone for all
noises to cease. I was cold, and in an attempt to stay warm
I masturbated but I forget what woman I fantasized about, she could
have been Sarah McLachlan but I'm not sure. This attempt to
stay warm didn't work very well (I remained cold
and the orgasm was rather weak).
I slept briefly, then went onward, around 3 a.m. I
would guess. Before I went on I was "air fiddling," sending some
Emile Benoit tunes to the new moon (actually it was two days
before new moon, it was early Sept. 6 and new moon was early
Sept. 8) and the ocean, my left hand the
sky, right the ocean, me in between. [words in the sky, music in
earth, me in between, song to give birth]

As I went on it got even thornier, a complete covering of the hillside
with overlapping thorny vines, with thorns spaces so than a finger
could not grip the vine between them, and blunt enough that they
pierced the outer layer of skin but not much further, so I did't lose
much blood. But both hands and feet had to be supported up the steep
hillside on thorns, and it was actually less agonizing to stay stuck
on them than to move a limb up from one set of thorns and place weight
on the next set. It felt like an evolutionary stairway to heaven; I
felt like a salmon caught in a net and at one point said out loud
or just thought silently "let this
atone for the deaths of the Beothuck people."

Every time I thought I was over the worst, suddenly there was more
(else I would have turned back long before). For a while I was
actually screaming a bit, but it being near 4 a.m. (I think) nobody
came, except I heard dog (Coyote?) footsteps approaching the thorns
and then receding, once. (This was under Raven new moon skies
[actually it was two days before new moon].)

Eventually I got near the top, and just before the top had a clear
vision of a glowing blue rose, of a colour blue that is partway from
sky blue to sea blue, but is closer to sky blue. At the time I did
not know or think about the
mystical significance of this, but just admired it briefly. I did
not touch it because it was the only one, and tried to smell it but if
there was any smell it was very delicate.

This rose was not a fuzzy or moving image or in the mind's eye or
closed eye vision, but actually growing right there in front of me,
three-dimensional and sharp, the clearest vision by far of any I have
ever had (I don't have visions, usually) if it was a vision (i.e., if
another observer there could not have seen it and a camera there
could not record it). I saw it clearly from close up, just inches away
from my eyes and I forget if it was clear close up and fuzzier
at a distance due to my lack of glasses or not.

Since this I have thought about it a bit but not talked too much with
others about it. The mystic blue rose (like the one in the song
Bright Blue Rose on Christy Moore's The Voyage recording) is I
think an important Sufi symbol. In Christianity there is the rose of
Sharon, and also the blue dress of Mary. The rose is an important
symbol in Ireland. But for me the blue rose symbolizes the living
planet, the earth, Gaia (who some call Mary).

However,
I am not associated with any religious organization nor do I intend
to start one. My current individualistic/eclectic
spirituality is described on deities
and beliefs and its subpages. I also try to
live by my non-religious messages,
on my main messages and
derived messages, but they are
non-religious messages and I do not consider them part
of my individualistic/eclectic spirituality working theories.

Oh, and for some the blue rose could
symbolize the fragrant blue Krishna, or equivalent to the blue
lotus. Originally I called it a blue flower, since I knew there
were no blue roses, but it did look more like a rose than lotuses
I have seen pictures of.
I suspect the words for lotus and rose in some ancient (or even
modern?) Indian language/dialect and/or Romany are similar in
pronounciation at least, and would appreciate knowledgeable comment
on this.

Shortly after the blue rose vision I came to the final clump of
thorns, a hedge-like mass spilling out onto the grass next to NW
Marine Drive. I could not get over this steep clump by lifting one
leg first since it would have caused my genitals to be hooked, which I
wanted to avoid. So I had to do a salmon leap forward onto my belly
and scramble on all fours over the clump. I made it!

The instant my tortured feet hit wet grass it felt like heaven, but
then I had to move, and walking even on wet grass (and then on
pavement) was agony, so I went back to hell. Without my glasses I
could not read street signs from very far. The pole lamps looked like
balls of light, unfocussed and glowing, or tree ornaments, or glowing
insect eyes. I wandered from door to door a bit (like the hero in
Rawlins Cross Wild Rose song), drank from an outdoor tap (which
was designed for a garden hose but didn't have one attached when
I drank from it), initially
went up the hill toward UBC but then turned around and went off on a
side street.

It was a grey morning, like the grey fairyland of celtic myth,
pre-dawn, and there was no sign of life, even no natural sounds, just
some of distant engines on the water. I began to believe that
everyone else had "gone on" and left me behind in a world devoid of
good sounds. But then I heard an early morning shakuhachi (or native)
flute player and wandered that way. However his or her gate was a
complicated one to my naked eyes, like a closed Nitobe Garden
inner/outer gate (actually Nitobe Garden gate is simpler, this was
like the wood-bounded path between the Asian Centre and Nitobe Garden
gate plus Nitobe Garden gate). So I went next door, where
there was a fountain in
the yard, and plonked myself down on the outdoor carpeted doorstep
between two large potted plants. Later the homeowner asked me to go
away or he'd call the police; I asked him to call me an ambulance, and
he did, and they took me to UBC hospital not far away.

In the Emergency ward I had the thought my hands were converted into
healing devices by the acupuncture effect of the thorns, and tried to
get up to help a woman suffering from bee sting reaction. But staff
restrained me gently, and wheeled me off to the mental health ward.
My first night there, when they closed the main doors I felt caged and
paranoid and placed one hand under the tap, one in the toilet,
envisioned a river running through me, and invoked Gaia to protect me.

Also for the first few days my thorn-damaged hands recieved
mini-shocks from metal cutlery, so I had to wrap it in a paper towel.
I think this was some kind of acupuncture/chi effect, due to
the natural acupuncture effect of the thorns, and may be why
many Asians do not use metal cutlery, but instead other materials.

I was fine after a few days, but stayed in for a few weeks while they
gradually built up my lithium.

I forgot to mention a few things about the five week hospital stay.

In addition to the tingling when I picked up metal utensils, I also
was a vegetarian for the first few days, then reverted. (Since then
I have gone back to a lacto-ovo-pisce-vegetarian diet, from Sept94 to
now.)

In the drawer of the room I was first admitted to, a previous patient
had left a copy of the third book in Fred Pohl & Jack Williamson's The
Starchild Trilogy. This book, Rogue Star, is partly about
intelligent stars, and I found this a spooky coincidence given the
sun stare episode.

My doctor's name was D. (David, I think) Irwin, so the same last name
as my yoga teacher.

In my room after the first day or two I began practicing some basic
yoga asanas, including the shoulder stand. After the first week or
two I was allowed out around campus during the day by myself. I
missed the first yoga class, but after that hospital staff allowed me
to go off campus on a bus to my yoga class, then back to the hospital
for the night, and even kept my supper for me. I don't think they
were supposed to do this but it sure helped. My yoga teacher Gioia
Irwin probably didn't know that for the last few weeks of Sept91 and
the first class of Oct91 I was in mental hospital. Since I had to
rush off after class I didn't get a chance to tell her then. Perhaps
I should have phoned her from hospital. Later I did tell her that I
was on lithium, and experienced occasional waning moon highs, but not
muh about my mystic experiences, sparks, tingling, etc. I owe her a
long letter soon. For those in Vancouver I highly recommend her as a
yoga teacher.

Earlier in my narrative I mentioned how the pre-dawn hours of Sept. 6,
1991 were grey, like the cold grey fairyland mentioned in the
recording by the Irish band Deanta (who I haven't heard yet) and
also in the partly fictional book The Mists of Avalon by Marion
Zimmer Bradley. When I was picked up by the ambulance I had slept
twice, once amidst the thorns and once on the doorstep, and was under
the impression that it was Saturday, not Friday. Hence for a while I
thought there was a missing day.

When in the hospital, not long after coming mostly out of it with the
aid of Ativan and Haldol and lithium, I wrote an "AGU Abstract"
(American Geophysical Union fall meeting Abstract) supposedly
for presentation at the
December fall meeting in San Francisco. It combined Gaia theory,
the collective consciousness and the theory of an intelligent
cyberspace, and said that humans could act as white blood cells in
healing the physical problems of Gaia (environmental problems) and
provide self-counselling strategies to heal the mental ills (social
problems). This I called "SocioEnvironMental Health" or something (I
have it somewhere). But my supervisor and friends gently dissuaded
me from sending it in (actually by the time I had access to mail/etc.
I had no intention of submitting it).